Friday, January 16, 2009

Should I soul search?

A reader set me a challenge:

Because people read your blog...so your words have power. what do you think the author of the published paper would feel? Did you just call the research a piece of junk/useless research? If you were in the same position and spent valuable time. And someone calls your research dead-end research? And how does this post help with anything. Why not be more positive...instead of being negative (and the problem is still there and nothing is solved). My suggestion: try to be more positive and talk is cheap. Be a problem solver and offer realistic suggestions, instead of complain, complain, complain :)

Here is my response:

What do you think the author of the published paper would feel?

I cannot care what the author feels. This sounds hard but science and intellectual debate is not about caring about other people. It is about caring about arguments. I write what I have in mind. I only attack someone's arguments or works but not the person itself. He or she might be the nicest person on Earth, might have put in one year of work, or might have been ill-advised by the supervisor; if I don't agree, I don't agree and will say so clearly. I will also not resort to mystical allusion like "I did not fully understand your arguments. Would you mind explaining them again to me. I am confused because I thought that X" but "I do not agree because of X."

I know the author a bit, and I do respect him for what he told me privately, but I simply disagree with some of his statements or directions of research. He is free to disagree with me in the Comment section or a guest post.

Did you just call the research a piece of junk/useless research?
Not as forceful as you just have. I wrote it is dead-end research.

If you were in the same position and spent valuable time. And someone calls your research dead-end research?
Again, it is utterly irrelevant how much time someone spent on something. I know what guy who spent 3 years on a complex computer simulation only to be proven wrong by a top expert in 5 minutes. It is though but it is science. My first reaction would be not be as you imagine. I would ask: What have I done wrong? Is it a dead-end? I would look at his or her arguments carefully, and see whether I really did a mistake. And then I would reply with counterarguments or agree that it is wrong or dead-end. Then I try to get back to that person and give counterarguments. Then either we agree to disagree, because I cannot really refute his arguments nor refute mine. Or I see that he or she is just making bogus arguments because of lack of understanding, intellectual overreach or an emotional and political motivation. Then I might go into political mode or ignore. But

Again I do not fight or see the person making the argument but I fight or see the arguments themselves! Here is how I visualize: I am commander of one army (my statement) and I have soldiers (the arguments) defending it. And someone else launching an attack. So I focus on his soldiers. Either one of us wins and the other gracefully surrenders his army (his statement), or we agree to disagree as no-one won.

My research is not part of me, so if you attack it or my ideas, I am still feeling OK! As a good scientist, you need to find this intellectual detachment from your emotions. In fact, I love being told that I am wrong because then I have learned something new!

And how does this post help with anything.
It is like the Emperor's clothes or the lack thereof! I am pointing out the obvious for me. And I am pointing out what many others tell me privately, but do not dare saying out of fear that the PC and consensus Gestapo knocks at their door. It helps to know what other people think of your research. Even if they are wrong, you can wrestle with their arguments, and you learned something. There is nothing worse for a researcher that being ignored after hard work or being smiled at with a superficial Well Done.

Also, I want to show people and especially students and therapists that it is OK to criticise other research findings. We need more debate in stuttering. And therefore I am moving the goal post of what is acceptable.

Why not be more positive...instead of being negative (and the problem is still there and nothing is solved).
Here is a counterexample. If I see cracks in a bridge or building, should I not report the cracks because I have no solution to getting rid of the cracks and I make the manager of the building feel bad about himself? If I see fraud or mismanagement happing, should I not whistle blow because I have no solution and hurt the feelings and jobs of those who work there? Of course, a solution would be great, but often there are no solutions, and the solution proposed is wrong, too!

This attitude is extremely dangerous in scientific research, because our minds get blinded by social considerations out for fear for the PC and consensus Gestapo. It is OK to point out weaknesses and be negative in research. Of course, doing therapy or organising a party is a whole different matter, where you need to work with other people and find common interests and goals.

My suggestion: try to be more positive and talk is cheap. Be a problem solver and offer realistic suggestions, instead of complain, complain, complain :)

You drive me completely insane! :-) You have not understand what science is about. Yes, in therapy or management or politics, it is all about problem solving and consensus building but not in science or intellectual debate, intellectual honesty is very very important. There is only one truth, but in social interaction there is none. You say what you have in your mind so that a debate can arise. You would be surprised but I am very consensus focused when it comes to non one-truth issues! But on science, just over my dead body! :-)

7 comments:

Anonymous
said...

Currently, there is one area of science where "communicating cracks in the bridge" is not acceptable.... global warming. Why, because of funding. Science conducted at the academy will remove objectivity for a research grant. Sometimes, one has to follow the money.

As a researcher myself I have to speak out and say I will have to agree with Tom. It is the regular life of a scientist to have his/her work critically reviewed and at times get papers based on painstakingly conducted research be outrightly rejected by journals. Of course this is not easy, but every time this happens, you learn something and most of the time it helps make the science better. It's not about getting your feelings hurt, it's about advancing knowledge.

A mentor of mine once told me, "If you want to be unconditionally loved, get a puppy. Otherwise, if you want to stay in science get used to the fact that your work will be criticized, and know that work interesting enough to be criticized is much better than work that does not get talked about at all."

Just another note in defense of Tom: It's not like all research has been criticized in this blog; Exciting and noteworthy work were given their due notice, often with a grain of salt, which is good.

Peer review usually works but sometimes the decision to accept a paper to be published can be arbitrary (someone could either get very lucky or unlucky depending on which reviewers you get). Journals that have higher impact are usually harder to get into--for instance 95% of papers submitted to the journal Nature gets rejected (this not only reflects the quality of the work required but also how broad of a readership would be interested in your work). It may be reasonable to say that in general, getting papers into more science oriented journals may be much more rigorous than getting papers into speech oriented journals. But again, it may depend on which reviewers/editor you get!S.

It may sound cynical, but a paper usually gets accepted when it corresponds with what the reviewers think is right. For example, in the science of physics, if somebody were to write a paper on a new unification theory, it would be impossible for it to be approved if the reviewers are string theorists. How about an alternative to the big bang theory? Same thing; the reviewers are likely to be biased toward the standard cosmological model. We saw how Arthur Eddington refused to accept Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar's correct theory of the fate of white dwarf stars. Eddington was very powerful and nobody had the balls to challenge him; his attitude set astrophysics back by a few decades.

Even in the world of stuttering "research", you would be horrified at Susan Block's unreasonable reaction when confronted by the Maguire therapy or the Valsalva technique. Why is she so unreasonable? Because Maguire is taking away customers from her smooth speech therapy, and that costs her money and prestige. In her speech pathology course at Latrobe University in Melbourne, she only teaches smooth speech therapy!

To get a paper accepted, you have to get past the "bully at the door". If the paper agrees with the bully's view of the world, then it gets accepted.

But these days, there is the internet. We can publish our views and theories on websites, blogs, newsgroups, etc., thus bypassing the bully at the door.